DR. THOMAS BROWNE. 381 



that there is some coaction between the medium and the 

 magnetic virtue of the earth, which results in the directive 

 tendency of the globe, and that the latter does not depend 

 upon the effused magnetic force acting in some unknown 

 way. He has no definite theory as to the magnetic virtue, 

 but regards the hypothesis of Descartes, and the notions 

 of Digby founded thereon, as equally worthy of belief. He 

 ridicules Digby's magnetic powder, and all magnetic 

 unguents for the cure of wounds generally; and then, with 

 characteristic shrewdness, puts his ringer at once upon the 

 real reason which underlay the healing effects which 

 seemed to follow the use of these nostrums. It is not 

 necessary, he thinks, to conceive of spirits to "convey the 

 action of the remedy unto the part and to conjoin the 

 virtues of bodies far disjoined," because only simple 

 wounds are ever healed, and these, when "kept clean, do 

 need no other hand than that of nature and the balsam of 

 the proper part." In other words, he had noted the rigid 

 requirement of all magnetic healers that, while the 

 weapon was to be anointed and dressed, the wound was to 

 be simply brought together, bound up in clean rags, and, 

 above all, to be let alone for seven days; and he had seen 

 that simple flesh injuries under this treatment healed 

 themselves by "first intention." 1 



Browne's experiments on the electrics are repetitions 

 of those already well known. He thinks that electric 

 effluvia behave like threads of syrup, which elongate and 

 contract, and, in contracting, bring back the attracted 

 objects. He arrives at the conclusion that no metal 

 attracts, "nor animal concretion we know, although polite 

 and smooth." But the "animal concretions" which he 

 has tried are extraordinary. They are elks' hoofs, hawks' 

 talons, the sword of a sword-fish, tortoise shells, sea-horse 

 and elephants' teeth, and unicorns' horns" indicating 

 that he had made up his mind that all ordinary substances 

 had already withstood the test of experiment, and further 



Paris' Pharmacologia, 23, 24. Mill: System of Logic, Vol. ii., 402. 



